Torrential rains, heavy summer floods, and typhoons have compounded North Korea’s dysfunctional food-distribution system, leaving millions — including many children — in danger of malnutrition, according to some media outlets and humanitarian-aid groups. But others contend that additional analysis is necessary to verify the circumstances.

Though their visit was tightly controlled by government officials, the AlterNet team got rare access to collective farms, orphanages, hospitals, rural clinics, schools, and nurseries. They reported evidence of alarming malnutrition, damaged crops, dire healthcare, and limited access to clean water, but also signs of some promise for the coming rice harvest. One journalist cautioned in a first-person account of the visit that the report’s findings may not be statistically representative.

This year’s harsh winter wiped out 65 percent of the barley, winter wheat, and potato crops in the South Hwanghae Province, which typically feeds two-thirds of the country’s population, the governing People’s Committee was reported as saying.

In March, the World Food Programme (WFP) estimated that 6 million North Koreans needed food assistance and that one-third of children under the age of five were chronically malnourished or stunted. In April, the WFP launched an emergency operation, citing reasons such as “bitter winter which hit crop production, a decline in bilateral and humanitarian assistance, and only limited international purchases of staple foods.”

Conflicting Reports of Crisis

As mentioned by Reuters, not everyone agrees with the way that North Korea’s circumstances have been portrayed. To wit, visiting scholars, tourists, and charity workers have sent out conflicting views about it, and some public officials have discounted it altogether.

Just last week, South Korea’s Unification Minister, Yu Woo-ik, who manages relations with North Korea, said he did not think that the situation is “very serious” and suggested that North Korea might be exaggerating the severity of its food crisis.

After visiting North Korea in September, the FAO said that “the damage was not so significant,” though the WFP — which has a regular presence in North Korea — had warned in March of growing hunger.

Appeals for International Aid Prove Difficult
North Korea’s attempts to solicit massive food aid have mostly fallen on deaf ears, with the United States and South Korea — the two biggest donors before sanctions were imposed in 2008 — saying they would not restart aid until they are certain that the military-led communist regime will not divert the aid for its own uses, nor until progress is made on disarmament talks.

Meanwhile, frustrated with North Korea’s severe restrictions on the movement of foreigners, the United Nations has announced it would only send aid to areas where it was allowed access, according to AFP. So far this year, only 30 percent of a U.N. food-aid target for North Korea has been met, Reuters reported.

Though North Korea has eased some of the restrictions in the face of the looming famine, humanitarian support is still only 10 percent of what it was a decade ago. The country is now one of the world’s most chronically under-funded humanitarian emergencies, Hiroyuki Konuma — the U.N. Food and Agriculture Organization’s (FAO) Asia representative — toldAFP.

As the U.N. presses for more freedom for aid agencies, U.N. humanitarian chief Valerie Amos is scheduled to visit North Korea next week, AFP reported. Reuters also noted that there have been conflicting reports out of North Korea as to how bad the situation really is, and this is another major reason for Amos’s visit.

, a Bulgaria native, is a Chicago-based reporter for Circle of Blue. She co-writes The Stream, a daily digest of international water news trends.
Interests: Europe, China, Environmental Policy, International Security.